


Dead Inside

by RockNRollGospels214



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Depression, F/M, Fluff, Happy Ending, Romance, Self-Hatred, fluffy flashbacks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-21
Updated: 2015-02-21
Packaged: 2018-03-14 08:15:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,749
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3403421
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RockNRollGospels214/pseuds/RockNRollGospels214
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Imagine that on a hunt a witch casts a spell on you, putting you in a deep coma. The only way to save you is if one of the boys gets inside your head and brings you back into reality. While Sam is inside your head, he ends up discovering how broken you really are and that you've just been hiding it this whole time. [MORE DETAILS IN AUTHOR'S NOTES]</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dead Inside

**Author's Note:**

> I know it sounds a little weird, but it's like one of those out-of-body spirit or deals where somebody goes into somebody else's head to pull them out of a coma or get them away from their reaper or something like that.
> 
> WARNING: This story contains a depressing story line/descriptions of self-hated/loathing & depression. If this triggers you or bothers you, DON'T READ!

Reader's POV

Hunting a witch certainly wasn't your favorite thing to do. At all.

You hated witches. You'd rather be chopping the head off a vamp or tasseling with a vengeful spirit. But nope, here you were, stuck with hunting one of those hex-bag induced spell bottle crazies.

You were with Sam at the moment, your boyfriend, and you had your gun aimed up and ready to fire in case the beast showed her face. "See anything?" You panted.

"No," Sam muttered back.

You'd all split up in the beginning, but you ran into Sam while you went running after her at one point, and he'd stuck with you since then.

"I hope Dean's alright..." You said, keeping your gaze ahead of you as you slowly made your way down the hallway of the old abandoned house that was this particular witch's "lair".

"He's fine...he's, Dean." Sam replied.

You felt the smallest of grins peek at the corner of your lips. "Yeah, you're right."

You and Sam continued your scope-out, looking for the practical animal that you were hunting.

"Sam, we better hurry up and find her, she's probably conjuring up another spell as we speak."

All of a sudden, you heard slow clapping from behind you. You spun around to see her standing there, a glowing potion bottle in hand.

"Well done, baby cakes." She cooed. "You actually figured something out for once."

"What's in the bottle, witchy?" You snapped, your gun still aimed at her even though you knew it probably wouldn't even harm her the slightest.

"Your worst nightmare." She replied.

"Hey, drop the bottle and nobody gets hurt." Sam growled.

"Don't play Mr. Hero with me, Winchester. We all know that's a lie. Somebody's going to be leaving this house tonight in their own coffin and that certainly won't be me."

"Where's Dean?" You suddenly chimed up.

"Oh, you mean the male model you both seem to adore so much? I've got him safe and sound."

"You let him go!" Sam yelled.

"Make me!"

You suddenly felt the anger surge through your veins, and without even thinking, you pulled the trigger on your gun. The bullet rang out and clipped the witch's shoulder, causing her to cry out in agony. But that pain soon turned to anger as she glared up at you.

"You think that's funny, little girl?! I know you're deepest weaknesses, and there's no getting past me!" She shouted, throwing the glowing bottle at you.

You shot your arm up in self defense, but it was no use, the potion got all over your forearm along with a few shards of glass slicing through your delicate skin.

"(Y/N)!" Sam called.

Your vision began to blur almost instantly and you felt yourself get beyond lightheaded, causing you to fall back and hit your head against the wall. You could barely make out Sam by your side as your ears began to ring and you felt your entire body begin to throb. Was it all really going to end like this?

Third Person POV

(Y/N)'s eyes fluttered shut as Sam held her in his arms.

"What did you to do her?!"

"Oh, nothing, just put her in a coma that will lead to a slow and painful death is all. She'll be so lost in the own Hell she's got brewing in her mind that it'll be over before she can even realize she's dead."

Just as she finished her sentence, Sam saw her suddenly jump and gasp, a look of pure horror on her face. She looked down, Sam's eyes following her gaze, to see none other than a sharpened piece of wood shoved through her abdomen from behind.

As her body fell, it revealed Dean standing there with the weapon in his hand.

"Hey, what happened?" Dean said seriously, making his way over to where (Y/N) laid motionless on the floor. Sam looked like he was about to pass out himself; his skin pale and his breathing ragged.

"I don't know, she threw some potion at her and the bottle broke all over her forearm, whatever it was must've poisoned her." Sam said shakily.

"You should've told me that before I killed her!" Dean shouted.

"Well I didn't know you were gonna stab her, genius! I thought you were tied up somewhere!"

"Okay, look, we've just gotta keep calm and try and fix this before it gets worse. You call Bobby, and I'll go try and find a spell book or something that might have some answers. Did she say anything about what it would do to (Y/N)?"

Sam looked up at his brother with teary eyes, "She said that it would be a slow and painful death, and that (Y/N) would be lost in her own Hell..." he trailed off, biting his lip to hold back the tears threatening to fall.

Dean got a hurt look on his face, "Call Bobby, it'll be okay." He made his way out of the room as Sam pulled out his phone.

Both of them knew that things looked faithless for the most part, and that if they didn't find answers soon then (Y/N) might be meeting Death sooner than they'd hoped.

"Come on, Bobby, pick up the phone," Sam whispered, practically hyperventilating.

"Hello?"

"Bobby! Please you've gotta help us," Sam rambled.

"Hey, calm down, what's wrong with you?"

"It's (Y/N), we were on this witch hunt, and the witch, I think she poisoned (Y/N)." Sam wiped the tears off of his face as he spoke.

"How so?"

"I don't know, she just through some potion bottle at her and after (Y/N) got hit with it she passed out, and her pulse is barely there."

"What color was the potion?"

"It was a really bright blue, kind of, like, um...I'm not sure, just, a bright blue color. Brighter than the sky, that's for sure." Sam choked out, his voice cracking every now and then.

"I think I know what it was, just give me a second to find the book. Get (Y/N) in the car and get her out of there. How far are you boys from my place?"

"Probably a few hours, but if Dean speeds then-"

"Just get here as quick as you can, I don't know how long she's got." Bobby said.

Once Sam and Dean got on the road, Sam was finally able to regain himself and stop crying, and Dean was flying so fast down the road Sam was beginning to worry that they were going to get into a deadly car crash. They'd been on the road for a while, and Sam knew they had to be getting to Bobby's soon, especially at this rate.

"How's she doing?" Dean called back.

Sam kept his hand on (Y/N)'s wrist, keeping track of her pulse.

"Her pulse is still slow, but it's there." Sam replied.

"Okay, we should be at Bobby's soon. Like, 20 minutes soon."

Just then, Sam's phone rang.

"It's Bobby," He said before answering. "Hello?"

"Hey, Sam, I found an answer, how far away are you?"

"About 20 minutes, is that soon enough?"

"Yeah, that'll be fine. And, this antidote isn't exactly what I was thinking it was going to be. It's a lot more complicated than anything I've ever seen."

"Lemme guess, we have to go find some mineral in some mystical cave in the bowls of Europe?"

"Sam, don't jinx us!" Dean shouted.

"No, actually," Bobby continued. "It's actually a bit more personal than that."

"Personal?"

"Just get over here, and fast. Idjit." Bobby said, hanging up the phone.

At Bobby's house, Sam carried (Y/N) inside and laid her on the couch in Bobby's living room.

"Can you get to explaining, Bobby?!" Dean shouted.

"Look, this isn't going to be easy." He replied.

"I don't care!" Sam yelled. "Whatever is we need to do let's just get to it already! I'm not letting somebody else that I love die because of me!"

Silence.

Bobby and Dean both knew what Sam meant, and Dean could even relate.

"Look," Bobby started. "One of you have to get inside her head and pull her out of the coma from the spell."

"What, like, an out-of-body spirit deal?" Dean asked.

"Pretty much."

"I'll do it." Sam piped up. "I'm not losing her because of a mistake I made."

Bobby and Dean exchanged looks before speaking. "Alright, let's get going." Dean muttered.

After Bobby gathered all of the herbs and ingredients needed for the ritual, Dean started drawing all of the symbols.

"Are you sure you wanna do this, Sammy?"

"Yes." Sam replied coldly. He was sitting next to (Y/N) on the couch, holding her pale hand, not letting go no matter what the circumstances were.

"I think that's it." Bobby spoke up.

"Okay." Sam muttered.

Once everything was all arranged, Bobby started reciting the words from the book and before they knew it, Sam's body went limp next to (Y/N)'s on the couch.

"Did it work?" Dean broke the silence.

"Let's hope so. I'm giving him half an hour, and they're not back then we're pulling Sam back before things turn bad. He's still got that tattoo, right?" Bobby asked.

"Yeah, why?"

"Dean, his spirit isn't in his body right now. It's the perfect chance for a demon or an angel or freaking something to take over. But if he's got that tattoo still then I feel a little better about it. We can't always trust hand-drawn symbols."

"You couldn't have mentioned this before hand?" Dean snapped.

"I didn't want to scare the daylights out of him, Dean!"

"Okay, whatever. Half an hour." Dean muttered, calming himself down.

Meanwhile, Inside (Y/N)'s Head:

Sam woke up in a dark and cold place. For a second, he thought he was in Hell. He quickly got to his feet and started looking around. He noticed that he was in some place that resembled a prison. There weren't any windows, the floors and walls were made of nothing but dark grey bricks and/or cinderblocks, and there was no noise except for the small puffs of breath escaping his mouth.

"(Y/N)!" He called out. "Are you there?!"

His voice echoed and eventually died out, leaving him again in silence.

He was about to call out again when he heard something. It was very faint, but it was still something.

"(Y/N)?!"

He heard the noise again, it was soft, but he recognized it.

Following the source of the noise, Sam made his way down a dark hallway until the sound got a little bit louder. He knew he was getting close to whatever it was.

Just before he tried calling out for (Y/N) again, he turned his head to see an open room with a horrifying sight in store for him. He slowly walked in, unsure if his mind was playing tricks on him or not.

"(Y/N)?" He muttered.

Reader's POV

You looked up slowly to see Sam standing there.

"Sam," you croaked out, your throat dry and burning like fire.

He quickly darted over next to you and got down to your level. You were sitting on the concrete floor with your arms chained above your head, wrists trapped in thick metal cuffs. "What happened? Where are we?"

"We're inside my head, Sam."

"What are you talking about? This, this isn't you..."

You wished you could tell Sam that he was right. This wasn't you. But the most upsetting part, is that it was. Your body was covered with blood, fresh and dried, and tons of wounds and scars. Dirt was smeared on any exposed skin as well, making you look like an animal who'd been beaten to death but was hanging on by a thread. That was how you went through life, how you felt. And you hated it. You never felt good enough, like anybody actually loved you. But, for as long as you could remember, you had always felt this way. Like heavy chains were dragging you down, restricting you. The scars and wounds covering your body represented how you really felt, beaten up and dead. You were dead inside. You just never showed it. You whipped on a smile and pretended to be okay, because you didn't want other people to have to be upset just because you were. It brought you joy to make somebody else smile or laugh, because that meant you knew that they didn't feel as broken as you, and that felt good.

"Sam, this, this is, me." You muttered. "This is how I've felt my whole life. Alone, depressed, hurt. I'm just broken."

Tears appeared in Sam's eyes when they met yours again. "Why didn't you say anything?"

"I didn't want you guys to have to worry. I've fought this long, what's a little longer?" You said, your voice dead and dry.

"(Y/N), we love you, to death." He said. "Dean does, I do, Bobby, Cas...I don't understand how you could feel this way."

"We all feel pain, Sam, and we all have different ways to cope." You croaked out. "Mine is just a bucket load of self-loathing."

Sam looked down and wiped the tears away from his eyes. "Okay, listen to me, I'm gonna fix this."

"Sam..."

"No, look at me. We need to get you out of your head first. That witch put you in here, and I'm going to get you out."

"Sam, I'm always inside my head...genius."

"I get that, put she trapped you in here. When you're not under this spell, you can pull yourself out of it. Right now, you can't, and I'm not letting you get hurt or worse." He said. "Now you've gotta look at me, and snap out of it. We've both got to get out of here."

"Sammy..."

"(Y/N), just focus. Think about Dean, and Bobby, they're waiting for you. And think about all of the good things we all share together. The laughs, the jokes, everything. You have to want out to be able to get out."

"I can't..." You coughed.

"Yes, you can." Sam said, rubbing your shoulder. "You're a hunter, (Y/N), and one of the strongest ones I know. You can do this."

Suddenly you remembered something, something you certainly wouldn't forget until you were dead for good: The night you first met Sam.

You were only a teenager, probably 13 or 14, and you were already neck-deep into the life of hunting. Your parents raised you into this life. They were two of the best hunters on the map until a couple of demons wiped them off the face of the Earth. You never knew what happened to them, that was, until you found them. Their motionless and torn up bodies in the woods behind the motel you were staying at. Your life had never had been the same after that night.

The tears streaked down your face as ran back to your motel room with shaky hands and locked the door behind you. Your lungs burned as your struggled to gain your breath. Your parents were dead. And you weren't sure what to do. What if whatever got them came after you? You were a hunter, and you knew the drill, but you'd never been on your own before.

You collapsed on the bed and started sobbing so hard you knew that your ribs would hurt later from raking so hard.

Suddenly there was a soft knock on the door, and you froze instantly. You sniffled once very softly, and felt your chest become tight as your heart began to jump with fear. 'It was probably back for me.' You thought. Whatever it was, and you really didn't want to find out. 'But, what if I could kill it? No, don't be ridiculous, you don't even know what weapon to use.'

Your thoughts got scrambled when you heard more soft knocking.

"Um, excuse me, are you alright?" You heard a masculine voice through the door. It sounded like a teenager, you knew for sure this kid wasn't a grown man yet. "I heard the door slam and just wanted to make sure everything was alright."

You inhaled a needed breath before responding as loud as you could, your voice still hoarse. "Yeah, I'm fine, thanks."

"Are you sure you don't need something?"

'Who the crap was this guy, interrogating my life. I swear I hate humans.' You thought to yourself.

You wiped the tears off your cheeks and did your best to regain yourself before answering the door. You opened the door slowly to see a guy probably a few years older than you standing there, and he wasn't half bad looking either.

"Hey, are you alright?" He asked suddenly, clearly seeing that you'd been crying.

"I'm fine," You said, "I'm just having a rough night." You sniffled again.

"Are you alone?" He asked.

Alone.

The word just pushed the already half-way plunged dagger straight through your heart. But you just swallowed the knot in your throat and answered him, "At the moment, yes, yes I am."

"Is there anything I could help you with? I feel bad leaving you alone like this."

Another tear rolled down my cheek, but I quickly wiped it away. "Um, I don't know," You sniffled again.

"My name's Sam," He said soothingly, holding out his hand.

"I'm (Y/N)," You responded politely, taking his hand into your grasp.

"My brother and I are a couple rooms down, you could come stay with us until your parents are back."

And then it hit you even harder. They weren't coming back.

"They're not coming back," You whispered, biting your lip as more tears threatened to fall.

"I'm sorry?"

"Look, I appreciate the help, but, you just wouldn't understand, my family, we do things a little differently than everybody else." You said, your voice shaky.

Sam glanced over your shoulder, and you saw his eyes grow slightly wide. You spun around and then remembered that your duffle was unpacked on your bed, and all of your weapons were spread across the mattress. And on the wall was all of the maps and pictures strung together with thread and pins, along with all of the hunting notes your parents had left.

"You're a hunter too?" He blurted out.

You turned back to him with a confused look. "You too?"

"Yeah, I travel with my big brother and dad...it's a really long story."

"So is mine, and I guess it's just taken a turn for the worst..." You said.

"What do you mean?"

More tears swelled up in your eyes. "I'm crying..." You started, but cried a little and had to start over again, "I'm crying because my parents have just been murdered."

His eyes shot open as you came undone and let the tears fall freely. "I just saw their bodies in the woods behind the motel, something got to them, but I have no idea what." You sobbed.

"Hey, it's going to be alright." He said, walking into your room and closing the door behind him. He wrapped you in a hug and let you cry on his shoulder. He rubbed your back soothingly and just let you get it all out. "Alright, I need you to listen to me," He said, pulling back a little to be able to see your face.

"I'm not going to leave you alone. My brother and I are alone while my dad's out on a hunt right now. Gather up your things and come stay with us for now, we'll help you get this all figured out, okay?"

Unable to form words, you just responded by nodding your head and wiping away more tears.

And that was that, that was the night you first met Dean, and Sam. Sam held you that night in his arms for hours while you cried. Eventually you just fell asleep, your body giving out from exhaustion.

John let you stay with the boys, unable to find any other people that would take you in at the moment. At first he strictly denied, but seeing that you literally had no where to go, and with some persuasion from the boys, he finally let you stay.

You grew up from there on out with Sam and Dean, staying up late working on hunts, going on food runs with Dean, the whole deal. After a few years of adjustment, you realized how lucky you were to have them. If Sam hadn't checked on you that night, you probably would've wound up dead yourself; either trying to kill what snatched your parents, or pulling the trigger on yourself from depression and anxiety.

As the years went by, you developed a small crush on Sam. At first you thought Dean was drop-dead gorgeous, but he was almost six years older than you and you saw his familiar pattern of one night stands as he got older. It just drove you away from him, and that's when your eyes fell on Sam. You found everything about him cute, the faces he made when he read books, or how excited he got when he figured something out, he was just special to you. And he treated you so sweetly sometimes, it only made you like him even more.

You found yourself staying behind with Sam more to do research, and you always cuddled and watched movies whenever Dean was out late at the bar. And you found out that not only was Sam your shoulder to cry on, but you were his as well. As the years went by and more chaos seemed to unfold, you found yourself calming down a crying Sam more and more often. You'd even have to calm down Dean sometimes.

By the time you were 23 and Sam was 25, you and Sam were basically a thing but just hadn't brought it amongst yourselves to realize it. Another memory had just flooded back, and you certainly couldn't forget this one either.

"Hey, Sammy?" You called as you made your way down the stairs in the main room of Bobby's house.

"Yeah, (Y/N)? Everything okay?" He asked as you walked over to him at the table.

"I'm fine," You chuckled, sitting down next to him. "I was just thinking that I owed you a thank you."

"For what?" Sam smiled.

"Everything. Today is the 11 year marker of the night we met."

"Oh, (Y/N), I completely forgot, I'm so sorry," He said, remembered that it also meant it had been 11 years since you'd lost your parents.

"For what?"

"About your parents..." He started.

"Don't worry about it...I mean, I miss them, a lot, but, that's the past. What can I do but move on, right?"

A small smile appeared on his lips, "I'm so proud of you."

You blushed and looked down. "Thanks, Sammy." You then remembered that was done with that nickname and corrected yourself. "Or, Sam, sorry." You smiled.

"Hey, it's no problem. I like it when you call me Sammy. It makes me feel younger."

"You're not that old," You smirked.

"I know, but still." A moment of silence fell between both of you before Sam broke it," Hey, this is totally off topic, but can I give you something?"

"Sure," You chuckled.

Sam reached across the table starting digging around in his backpack for something. "No peeking," He said, looking over at you.

"Ugh, fine." You sighed, covering your eyes with your hands.

"Now, open."

You opened your eyes to see a beautiful rose with a black bow tied around the middle of the stem lying on the table in front of you. But it wasn't just any kind of rose, it was a white rose, and the petals had deep crimson red edges.

"Sam, it's, it's beautiful..."

"That's why it made me think of you."

You felt tears prick at your eyes when you looked up to him. "Sam...I love you." You whispered before wrapping your arms around him. Nobody had ever called you beautiful before.

"I love you too." He said, pulling back from the hug and giving you a kiss on the lips.

And then your eyes opened. For real. Your eyes focused on Bobby's stained living room ceiling as your lungs gasped sharply for air.

Bobby and Dean came rushing to your side. "Hey, you alright?" Dean's gruff voice asked as he put a hand on your shoulder to help you sit up.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine," You panted.

Sam was the next to wake up, his body jolting back to life much like yours.

Your name was the first word that he said before he wrapped you in a tight hug. "Are you okay?"

"Sam," You said, knowing that he was going to treat you differently after what he'd seen. "I'm fine. I promise."

He pulled back and looked at you with concern flooding his eyes. You gave him a soft nod to reassure him that the subject of what he'd just witnessed did not need to be brought up in front of the peanut gallery that was Bobby and Dean.

Dean was the next to give you a hug, and Bobby after.

"Thanks for, saving my butt." You chuckled.

"Isn't that what we do?" Dean smirked.

"I guess it is. I'll try and be more careful next time, I shouldn't have stood there like that..." You said.

"Hey, don't take this out on yourself..." Sam began. "You didn't see it coming."

"Yeah, I guess I didn't." You said softly.

Later that night, you'd gone up to bed and were only minutes from falling into a deep sleep when your door creaked open slowly. You looked up to see none other than Sam standing there.

"Hey, just wanted to check on you." He said softly.

"I'm fine," You muttered out, voice heavy with fatigue.

"Look, I know that you're not going to want to bring it up," He said, sitting down on the edge of the bed next to you as you sat up. "But I think it's important that we do."

"Sam..." You exhaled, "I understand that your worried, but, everything that you saw, it's all me. I've lived feeling like that for as long as I can remember. I've just learned to cope."

"I just want to help you." He said lovingly. "I mean, that, was...dark, depressing...I know that you're not like that. You're so happy all the time, and your smile is contagious, you even make Dean laugh when he's so cranky I can't even talk to him."

"I know, I know. I guess I'm just a really good actor." You sighed.

"I don't want you to have to live like this..."

"But I do live like this. And, it makes me the person that I am. And no, not all of my happiness is an act. Deep down, I am broken, but aren't we all? I mean, look at us, Sammy, we've all got something to be broken up about. It's the cracks and scars that make us who we are. And everything that gets dropped doesn't always get broken...sometimes they just need a little picking up."

Sam smiled at you, knowing exactly what you meant. "I love you, so, so much." He said, pulling you in for a kiss.

"I love you too." You replied.

You then looked over at your clock, and it had just struck 12:13pm. It had officially been 11 years. This time 11 years ago, you were in that crappy old motel room with Sam and Dean, officially meeting them for the very first time.

You thought about everything that had happened since then, and you knew how you felt, and sometimes, you wanted to be a little bit happier. But, not much happiness came with this line of life. So, you knew that you had to except your fate. It'd only been by pure and utter fate that Sam checked on you that night. And you had a family, a loving soul mate, but you knew you were going to have to settle for the way you've always felt, and accept your battle scars as proof that you fought a war and won. And there was no mistake in knowing that you were practically dead inside, but that made you a warrior, and you were proud of that.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!


End file.
